


For My One and Only

by MarshmallowNerd



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Canon Divergence - Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), F/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-17
Updated: 2019-06-17
Packaged: 2020-05-13 10:00:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19248898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MarshmallowNerd/pseuds/MarshmallowNerd
Summary: The hidden White Wolf of Wakanda is finally ready to re-enter the rest of the world. And his first mission is to find the little witch who first helped him regain control of his own mind.





	For My One and Only

**Author's Note:**

> So, this story was mostly meant to be a self-experiment in writing for a genre I’ve never tried writing before. That is, graphic smut (though with me being me, I had to throw in some extra feels as well). Obviously, that means the following content contains sex, so please mind the story’s rating for adult content.

He finds her in Scotland.

It wasn’t exactly a lengthy search. He knew she was still traveling with Steve, doing rogue missions here and there with him, Sam, and Nat. Given how Steve and T’Challa were keeping tabs on each other, all it took were a few questions to the king, and Bucky knew the rough area to look. At the moment, he wonders if T’Challa told the team to expect him, because Steve hadn’t offered any of the questions Bucky was expecting when the punk first heard he had decided to leave the shelter of Wakanda at last. There were no “are you sure you’re ready” or “do you want to stay with us” conversations. There was nothing from Steve at all.

And yet, as he wanders the streets of Edinburgh, and he spots her in the window of some innocuous diner, he can tell she’s been waiting for him. She’s sitting alone, sipping from a small cup and watching the door far too often for it to be mistaken as her merely observing everyone who comes and goes. Although she looks down just as he reaches the entryway, so it isn’t until he’s halfway to her table that she notices him. The second she does, she jumps to her feet.

They’re not even a foot apart when his brain suddenly fails him. It freezes, just like that godforsaken machine Princess Shuri wanted to put him in. The machine she _would_ have put him in if it hadn’t been for the witch right in front of him being so willing to help him by using her own abilities.

It’s been so long since then. Nearly a year since he last saw her at all, and in his eagerness to get here, it only occurs to him _now_ that she could have changed since then. Maybe even realized that an old, semi-stable super soldier isn’t the kind of company she wants to keep.

But then Wanda smiles—a soft, shy thing at the corners of her mouth—and his heart finally calms. “Hi,” she breathes.

He scrounges the far corners of his now semi-cooperative mind to find something that fully encompasses what this means to him, her being so welcoming even after he let her go an entire year ago. But all he manages is a simple reiteration of what she’s already offered. “Hi.”

From there, silence falls between them. Distantly, he’s aware there are other patrons around them, making a fuss over whatever sports event is being televised on the screen behind him. But he has eyes only for her.

He thinks maybe if he waits long enough, the words he’s been wanting to say since his train arrived a few miles near here will spontaneously take shape. He can see her eyes roaming his face, but not actually reading him, as if she too is stalling for time until she can think of something to say.

She’s the first one of them to find something. “You look well.”

Bucky looks down at himself without really thinking of it. It isn’t that he doesn’t believe her; he actually did put _some_ effort into washing his hair and trimming his beard so he could appear somewhat presentable before he left Wakanda.

“I...thank you,” he says, embarrassed at how difficult this is turning out to be (for him, at least). “You too.”

He sees her blush despite the dim lighting of the diner. She looks away as her fingers stroke the ends of her hair that are still visible with her knitted beanie on. He had noticed _that_ change when he first saw her in the window. Her hair is a lighter, ginger color now. A precaution taken now that she’s on the run, he figures. Just like her lack of the distinct accent that used to color her voice when she stayed up late at night with him in their safe house within the central city of Wakanda.

She looks at the other patrons around them before meeting his gaze again, fingers fiddling with the new set of rings that decorate them. “Did you want to…do you want to walk or…?”

“Um…” His eyes take their own sweep of the room. No one seems to be paying them any attention, but that could easily change at any moment, which makes him nervous. They’re both still considered wanted criminals, and he hasn’t taken nearly as many precautions as she has to make himself less recognizable. “Please?”

Wanda nods, and he knows she understands his reasoning. He trusts it isn’t because she sees it in his mind, but because they’re friends. She understands him, and that’s one of the reasons he’s missed her so much.

Besides, she doesn’t seem bent on staying here either, given how she hadn’t removed her jacket when she was sitting on her own. He remembers that large crowds bother her, too. He remembers walking with her through the marketplace in Wakanda’s central city, with her telling him how her powers could pick up every surface thought or emotion of the people around, and how often that sensation made her overwhelmed in the past.

Here and now, she pulls out a few bills from her pocket and leaves them on the table. He can see now that she only had water, but figures she wants to leave something anyway for her server’s trouble. And with that, he’s following her outside, easily finding a comfortable pace to stroll down the street.

He’s a little surprised when she wraps her arm around his, but quickly relaxes at the touch. He even bends his elbow to make it easier for her to hold onto.

“Is this the new one?” she asks. Her voice is quiet, even though out here, there doesn’t seem to be anyone around to potentially listen in on their conversation.

Bucky instantly knows what she’s referring to, and answers, “Yeah. It is.”

“It feels nice.”

The arm she’s talking about is currently hidden beneath a thick coat and leather glove. Though from the way she runs her free hand over his sleeve, he can tell she feels through the material how much smoother this one is. He doesn’t know why his face flushes at her compliment; it’s not like he made it.

“It works. That’s all I care about.” He doesn’t really mean that. It _is_ the first replacement he’s accepted since losing the old prosthetic in Siberia, and even he has come to appreciate its sleeker, less jerky design. Knowing she likes it too (even though she isn’t actually seeing it) makes his own appreciation feel a little more valid. Especially after he resisted getting another for so long, until the previous evening, when he realized travelling without one arm could garner unwanted attention to himself.

But he doesn’t want to admit that he finally accepted a prosthetic from Shuri solely for the purpose of seeing Wanda. The witch knows how he feels about having a metal arm, how it reminds him of his life of forced fighting and torture. He doesn’t think he can stand to listen to her insist she’s not worthy of a large decision like getting a new arm for himself.

“Don’t think I can say the same for the princess, though,” he continues, only half-joking. “I keep waiting for her to call, saying she needs me back there to receive improved prototype number 47 or something.”

“Let her tinker,” Wanda insists playfully.

“Eh,” he grunts dismissively, which makes her laugh. He’s able to revel in the sound for a few seconds before she speaks again.

“And otherwise? How is everyone over there?”

“Good. Everyone’s good.” Part of him wishes he had a better answer to offer. In truth, ever since she and the rest of Steve’s team left, he stayed secluded from most of the Wakandan society, on a small farm at the very edge of the country. He doesn’t know too much about what the royal family was going through beyond whatever one of them happened to mention while checking in on him for Steve’s sake.

“I’m glad.”

Despite his eyes being on the road ahead of them, Bucky can feel Wanda’s own gaze on him. Or, maybe he thinks so because the hand around his arm has started to tenderly massage the metal plates through the fabric of his jacket. It feels less like she’s trying to adapt to the texture now and more like she’s trying to comfort him.

“And how are you? Is this OK?”

This time he isn’t entirely sure what she’s referring to. Being back in the world? Being out here with her?

“I’m fine,” he settles on. “Didn’t expect it to be this cold.”

He only added the last bit to keep the conversation from dying. However, the way it makes her instantly stop in her tracks tells him it was the wrong thing to say. Of course she would remember how he usually feels about the cold, how it reminds him of Hydra’s cryo-chamber—of all the same things he associates with the metal arm.

“Sorry,” she says, as if it’s her fault the weather here is like this at this time of year.

He doesn’t get a chance to assure her there’s no need to worry before she’s slipping her hand in his gloved one and gently tugging him toward a new direction. “Here. Come with me.”

He has plenty of time to tell her that the weather doesn’t bother him as intensely as she probably thinks, but he never does. Somehow, he knows protection from the cold will entail protection from the possibility of prying eyes as well. He’s curious to see what she considers a safe place for them here.

The place she leads him to is a modest, out-of-the-way hostel. The budding rain clouds over it should probably make it feel ominous, but they don’t. If Wanda trusts it, he knows he can too. She’s clearly been here at least once before, because she already has a key to a room on the second floor. The room is spacious, yet cozy and clean. Though he doesn’t miss the fact that there’s no sign of anyone else staying there. It makes him worry a moment for Steve, and where he could be, but he forces himself to relax upon remembering Wanda wouldn’t be this calm if she had been forcibly separated from anyone on the team.

He lingers by the door while she goes to the other side of the room, sliding the curtains open. “Is this better?” she wonders not unkindly, still moving to turn on the lamps scattered around the room’s perimeter.

“It is,” Bucky replies. And he means it. As he stuffs his hands in his jacket pockets, he slowly wanders along the wall opposite of her. He can tell that the walls are thick, since he can’t hear any of the other patrons staying here, and it’s roomy enough that he doesn’t have to worry about whether he’s smothering the witch’s personal space. “Did Steve find it?”

“No, I did.” Wanda sits on the corner of the bed nearest him, toying with her rings again. He can’t imagine what she has to be nervous about now that he can see how well she’s been able to function here, in the real world, all this time while he was hiding away, secluded in a remote jungle paradise. “But he is nearby, if we need him. He always says it’s best for us all to stay close.”

That takes him by surprise. “You mean you don’t always stay together?”

“Usually we do,” she says quickly, as if she can tell the idea of the team travelling apart from one another disturbs him. It shouldn’t, but it does all the same. He knows everyone on the team can handle themselves. Yet, after they were first brought to Wakanda last year, and Bucky saw how some of them had been treated while they were imprisoned at the Raft—seeing how _abused_ Wanda had been there, he learned not to trust _other people_ around them.

“We just take some time to ourselves when we can,” she explains. “Personal reprieve, mental health break—that sort of thing. That’s usually when Steve goes to visit you.”

Her eyes briefly wander toward something in the corner by the door, and in the shadows there, Bucky can see a lone backpack with a small, square device precariously balanced at its top. “I am supposed to be checking in with him and Natasha, though. I haven’t been very good about that today.”

“So…they’re still doing good?”

“Oh, yes. Well, they’re at least making the most with what we can. Happy to hear you’ve been doing better, too.”

Bucky can’t help but snort a little. “I can’t imagine Wilson’s happy to hear anything having to do with me.”

She laughs at that, clearly familiar with his light rivalry with Steve’s new right-hand. “Well, he tells _us_ one thing. For all we know, he could be speaking differently to Colonel Rhodes when he visits with him.”

He gives a slight hum in response. “And you? Who do you go to with your complaints about me?”

Wanda laughs again. “No one! If anything, I…”

She stops herself for a moment, pulling her knitted cap off to fiddle with that instead of her rings now. “I actually quite miss having you to talk to,” she admits eventually.

Bucky replies without thinking, somehow summoning the confident smirk of his old self for the first time in what feels like forever. “Hey, now, you don’t have to say that just to make me feel better, doll.”

He barely registers that he used a pet name until he sees Wanda blush immediately after. He hadn’t even noticed he’d unconsciously wandered further into the heart of the room, and was now standing close enough to her to see it. “It’s true! I quite miss going to you for things.”

“Yeah, well…” He drops his gaze to the floor, much like how he drops the cocky façade. Which probably isn’t wise; he recognizes this is his opportunity to finally get to what he came out here to say in the first place, and he’s going to need that self-confidence in order to do so. “I missed you, too. I’ve actually, um…I wanted to come out here to, uh…to say thank you for helping me out back there.”

“Oh, you shouldn’t have,” she insists. “Really, _I_ should have been the one to thank you a long time ago. If it wasn’t for the practice you let me get with my powers…”  

A tiny knot of scarlet crawls into her palm then, which she promptly tightens her fingers around to snuff out. Her being surprised to find it there means she made it subconsciously, maybe even because she was nervous. Despite his belief that she has no reason to be, it puts him a little more at ease to know he isn’t the only one that isn’t sure where their relationship stands in relation to these more sensitive topics anymore.

“I probably wouldn’t have made it out here, myself, if not for that.”

Bucky isn’t sure what to say to that. It feels odd to accept thanks for what was essentially just his screwed up brain at work. True, it was his decision to take her up on her offer to use her scarlet on him (despite everyone involved being uncertain that method would even work), but still. He considered it all a higher risk on her part, given how much loathing for her powers she’d internalized after her abuse at the Raft. He still thought it pretty selfish of him to have her force herself to deal with that (sooner than necessary, for all he knew) for the sake of his own comfort, so he wouldn’t have to bear the process of cryo-freeze again, even at Shuri’s trustworthy hands.

Wanda seems to sense something about the whole ordeal is still bothering him. She scoots further along the edge of the bed to be closer to him. “I don’t blame you for it, you know,” she says softly. “Why we were there…”

“Yeah, I know,” he interrupts gently, to spare them both the unpleasant memory of how she ended up at the Raft. She may not blame him for it, but _he_ does. He feels like he was essentially abandoning her and the rest of Steve’s friends at the airport in Leipzig to be captured by the authorities, while he escaped to Siberia (which had only ended in further disaster for him and Steve and Stark anyways). “I just, um…”

He doesn’t know where he was going with that. To keep from embarrassing himself, he clears his throat and jumps to something else. “I still have some trouble sleeping sometimes. And those nights when I can’t, that’s when I start wonderin’ about what you would do or say if you were still there. I just...miss having you around.”

Belatedly, he realizes how that sounds. Shaking his head, he quickly adds, “I’m sorry. I’m not trying to make you feel bad about—”

“No, no, it’s OK,” she assures. “I’ve missed you, too. And I wonder about you, too. Usually if you’re alright. How you are, if something’s happened—if you have someone there for you if anything does.”

He can’t help the mirthless chuckle that escapes him.

“What?” The witch tilts her head curiously.

“Nothing. Just feel like I should be the one asking you all that. You know, since you’re the one that’s actually been out here, in the world, doing things for other people.”

“Well, I…” She tucks some of her hair behind her ear, the same way he’s come to notice she does when she doesn’t know how else to take kind words from him. “I mean, I have Steve and the others looking out for me. Keeping good company. Is there anyone keeping you company?”

He shrugs dismissively. “Sort of. I’ve got the princess, always looking to study the arm for potential upgrades. And there’s a few families at the borderlands I moved to, who ask me for favours sometimes.”

“So, you are doing good for others, too.”

“Well, I…” He runs his flesh hand through his hair, then laughs a little as he catches himself recreating her moment of self-consciousness. “Yeah, I guess.”

She smiles, looking proud that he accepted her words. “When do you think you’ll go back?”

“I don’t know. I…” He tries to think, having just now realized he hadn’t actually thought of what he wanted to do with himself beyond this. Beyond finding her. “I don’t know.”

“That’s fine. I don’t have anywhere I need to be for a while. That is, unless Steve told you differently before you came over.”

“No, I haven’t heard from him since before I left.”

Confusion wrinkles her brow then. “You haven’t…you mean you didn’t see him before coming here?”

“No…was I supposed to?” Bucky’s heart skips a little. Knowing how unstable this current lifestyle (if it can be called that) is for her, and for Steve’s other friends, and even himself right now, a miscommunication of any kind could lead to dangerous consequences.

“No,” Wanda assures. “I mean, I don’t entirely know. I just thought you would want to see him first.”

“Well, yeah, I was hoping to see him at some point. But I wanted to see you first. You know, to thank you,” he adds quickly, for his self-consciousness over being too overbearing slithers back into place. “To say thanks for…for being there for me. I mean, I know Steve was too, but you…you understood what it was like more.”

He hesitates, unsure if he should draw more attention than necessary to their shared experiences under Hydra. “It was a really…tough spot for me. And having someone like you around to help get me through it…I think it’s what kept me sane during it all.”

“Someone like me…” she muses.

“Yeah…” Again, it takes a couple of heartbeats for him to realize how she could possibly misread his words. “I’m sorry—I didn’t mean that like—”

“No, I know,” she’s quick to reassure. And he sighs in relief because he believes her. She can read him well, even without her telepathy. It’s another reason he’s missed her company.

“It’s just…” she starts, only to get cut off by her own breath of laughter to herself. “When I last spoke with him, Steve said something just like that. Apparently, he’s started to notice how we get along. And after he suggested I take my personal leave, that’s when he told us you were leaving Wakanda. I think he…I don’t know. It just felt like he wanted us to be alone together. I think so it would feel like another one of those nights we would spend at the capital. But something about it—or the way he talked about it, really…I don’t know, he made it seem like he was convinced that we…”

She never finishes, and that makes him nervous. He trusts Steve with his life, but when it comes to being discreet about the feelings Bucky has for a girl (especially a gorgeous, bright woman who is patient enough to deal with the troubled remnants of a person he is now), he doesn’t trust that punk in the slightest. He even holds his breath when the witch’s gaze on him becomes more curious.

“Can I…” She second-guesses herself for a moment, and he can see her shoulders rise and fall with the deep breath she takes. “May I ask you something?”

His heart pounds the way it does in a fight. He waits a while for it to settle, at least until he’s confident in his ability to speak evenly. “Sure.”

“Do you have feelings for me?”

His face flushes at the mere idea of answering that. His heart speeds back up, and his first instinct is to run. Maybe find Steve, and give the punk a piece of his mind for reading so deeply (so _accurately_ ) into what was forming between him and Wanda while they were all in Wakanda. But he knows he shouldn’t—he _can’t_ bolt now. Not from Wanda, who will surely assume the worst if he did. Who will likely tear into herself for upsetting him when it isn’t her fault at all, but his own mind. His goddamn head, which is still only semi-stable and still wholly insecure of his place in the world. Of his place in _her_ world.

He needs to calm down. She may be unwilling to betray his trust by looking into his thoughts, but he knows there’s little she can do to keep her scarlet from picking up the surface of mind activity. If he feels a certain emotion strongly enough, her powers may even absorb it for her to feel herself.

“I do,” he eventually finds. “Of course I do. I mean…given everything that’s goin’ on right now for you, and…after the time we spent together, I got to know you, so of course I’d care if anything—well…if anything _else_ happened to you.”

“I know that,” Wanda murmurs. “But what I meant was…”

She trails off again, leaving them with a long silence. Distantly, he’s aware that it’s a fair opening for him to ask the same question of her, but he’s too distracted to even try. Instead, he thinks of how stupid he was to forget about her powers in every other instance, and their part in reading how he feels around her (even if against her own accord) just like Steve has.

“James?” the witch presses tentatively, sitting up straighter. “Do you love me?”

Now he panics. Any previous concern he had about her scarlet picking up on it are far from his mind. Those powers probably clued her in to his answer to that question long ago, and she’s just now recognizing what it was all along. He knows _he_ barely recognized it until fairly recently, when he was wandering his designated farm property, sleepless and tired of missing her. Having to confront it in front of her so soon into his visit…he’s afraid. What if that kind of attention from him—someone with the amount of _baggage_ he has—is too much for her? What if it shatters the tentative bridge between them?

He lets his tongue run without thought, too desperate to steer the conversation elsewhere. “Do you love _me?_ ”

For an endless moment, all she does is tilt her head. Then, just when he starts to think he’s going to go out of his mind with suspense, she begins to move. She tucks her knees beneath her on the bed, making herself sit up a little taller, able to meet his eye better. So he can see the ways she _has_ changed in the time spent away from him. As much as she’s still careful around him, mindful that it’s still a struggle to be in his own mind sometimes, she’s a bolder person now. Someone who’s more sure of herself, less haunted by the events that put her into a life of hiding in the first place. And she’s not about to let him hide from her now.

“Do _you_ love _me?_ ” she asks again, her tone gentle yet firm all at once. It leaves less room for him to deflect to another matter.

Still, he wants to. There’s something horrid gnawing at his chest, something he doesn’t think he’s felt since he was first faced with the prospect of going into cryo-freeze again. A sort of fear he has no right to feel at the moment. He can’t do anything about how he feels about Wanda. And he shouldn’t be afraid, especially not when she can probably sense it, can possibly misread it as a fear _of_ her, which is so far from what he wants.

He tries to calm his mind by focusing on his hands, much like how he’s often seen her do. He tugs off the glove on his metal hand, letting his flesh one run over the sleek black plates, tracing the gold lining between them. It does help him anchor himself and slow his thoughts down.

Finally, for her peace of mind, he pushes himself to speak. “…yeah. I do.”

He’s still studying the details of his prosthetic as another silence falls between them. Now that he’s confirmed her suspicions, and it’s out there, unable to be taken away or denied, his heart picks up another battle-ready pace. It makes more words spill out of him. “But you don’t—if you don’t feel the same, you don’t have to—”

“No, no, no, I do.” There’s a slight creak from the bed at how quickly she scrambles off, hurrying to close the few remaining feet between them. Her hands grab onto each of his arms, giving a light squeeze as if to wordlessly urge him to face her properly. He does so only when it occurs to him what she just said.

Her own words seem to belatedly strike her as well. She eases her grip on him, taking another deep, thoughtful breath. “I care about you, too. When we first started staying in the city, I…I wasn’t OK. And you being there for me whenever I got particularly lonely, and being the only person willing to give… _this_ ,” she holds up a hand between them, wherein a miniature ball of scarlet appears at her fingertips, rolling around her middle finger as if magnetically tethered to it, “any sort of chance for the first time since before the, um...prison.”

She swallows uncomfortably at the thought before finding the nerve to go on. “It kept me sane, just as much as you keep saying I did for you. And I know I should have said it earlier, but…that meant so much to me. _You_ mean a lot to me, and I…I love you, too.”

A nervous smile is on her face as she searches Bucky’s eyes for a reaction. It takes him a while, due to how screwed up his damn brain is. It refuses to cooperate right away, to fully process that this is actually turning out OK. More than OK—it’s probably the best thing that’s happened to him since those first few months in Wakanda, where Wanda’s scarlet successfully soothed his troubled memories and Shuri began her methods of physical therapy with his lost arm.

Wanda loves him, too.

As his shoddy mind finally accepts the thought, he can feel a heat rising in his cheeks and a dumb grin spreading on his face. “Yeah?”

Wanda nods.

“OK…OK, then!”

His excitement makes her laugh, a sound of both relief and shared joy. It’s an amazing sound.

_He_ feels amazing. Like a great weight has been taken off his shoulders, leaving him mercifully lighter. Like he’s freer to do anything he wants to (granted, a dangerous thing to believe, because they’re still anything _but_ free with their current status as fugitives). However, there is only one thing he can think of to want now.

“I, um…” He clears his throat, his nerves suddenly returning full-force in his chest. “Can I try something?”

Wanda isn’t as nervous as he is anymore. She doesn’t even hesitate to nod at his question, which helps put him more at ease. “If you want to.”

He does. Oh, how he does. But it’s something new, something that might actually push things further than she can handle. Thus, he moves carefully slow to tuck his glove into his left pocket, leaving both hands free to reach up and cup her face between them. A bout of self-consciousness rushes over him at the sight of the metal one, so cold and hard and burdened with a dark history. So seemingly unfit against the pure, pliable skin of her cheek.

Bucky’s quick to dismiss the negative thought. It has no place here. Not anymore. Instead, he focuses on her. She wraps her hands around his arms again, sliding up to squeeze his wrists at the same time he leans closer to her face, as if she’s intentionally guiding him to her. She barely reaches his chin, so she has to stretch up a bit to meet him halfway, until his lips tentatively brush hers.

He only intends for it to be a chaste kiss, to test the waters of their physical comfort with each other. But it turns out he underestimated her—underestimated them both, in fact—and how much they’ve missed physical contact like this, with someone they trust. Wanda even follows him when he tries to pull away, recapturing his mouth. The way her lips slide over his is a little insistent, and a little clumsy, given they both lack practice. But it also feels good, and pure, and perfect, even though it’s questionable whether either of them are any of those things. It feels right. _Safe_.

When they do break apart, he hears her utter a tiny sigh. He can feel the puff of air against his throat, just before she drops her forehead against his chest. He winds his arms around her, pulling her even closer to him in a tight embrace. For a moment, all he needs is to feel her pressed against him, to refamiliarize himself with how she feels. How warm she is, how much smaller she is compared to him. How she hugs him with her nose burrowed into his shoulder (in this case, the flesh one) and her arms respectfully about his middle. How unique her skin feels, thrumming with the unseen presence of an ethereal power running like a second pulse alongside her veins.

Another sigh leaves her, this time fanning out against his shoulder. This time sounding mournful. “I don’t want you to go back,” she whispers. “I know you don’t want this life anymore, but…”

“I’m not.” He tries to reassure her with a kiss to her shoulder. “I’m not going back. I’m with you. I’m going wherever you wanna go.”

She pulls away then, though keeps herself within his arms. One of her hands slides up behind his head, nails gently scratching his skull there. It’s grounding, and marvelous, and it takes everything in him not to completely sag against her smaller frame at the feeling.

“Say that again?” she implores softly. “Please?”

Her fingers tighten around a few locks of his hair, as if she’s distressed by something. To his surprise, tears have started welling in her eyes. Tears that gather despite her wide smile, tears that never actually fall. Tears of wholly-consuming _relief_ to hear she has him again. After losing as much as she has, he realizes what it must mean to her to have something like this again. To have someone she lost find their way back to her.

He’ll remind her as many times as she needs. “Wherever you wanna go, I’m with you, _koldun’ya_. I’m yours.”

She nods, eyelashes fluttering rapidly as she tries to rid herself of tears. “I’m glad, _soldat_.”

“I’m not going back. I’m not staying behind anymore.”

She stretches up again, lips hovering near his with a coy smile. “I’m glad,” she murmurs, mere seconds before she seals her mouth over his in another kiss. One that’s just as slow and careful as the last one was, but also more passionate. This time, it’s less of an exploration. It’s more like a promise.

* * *

Five days pass like they’re nothing. On that first day after Bucky arrived in Edinburgh, Steve sent a message that he, Sam, and Nat had to move to one of the neighboring towns to avoid a group of mercenaries that had recognized them. As anxious as they all seem about being too far away from Wanda and Bucky, their new temporary location sounds more secure for them, at least to stay for the rest of the week. Which means the soldier and the witch have some extra time to spend alone together in Edinburgh, before the team comes for them.

And at the end of each day, Bucky resents himself a little more for taking so long to get here himself. He can’t even fathom why he was ever afraid to come looking for the witch. The time they spend together is hardly any different from how they were together while in Wakanda, recounting memories of the safer parts of their pasts for each other late at night and exchanging comforting touches when needed (albeit, less restrained this time around), and sometimes sharing a mug of tea and honey when Wanda has the craving for it. Only now, things are better because they spend whole days together too.

Of course, they have to be careful about where they go. When Wanda starts getting claustrophobic with the same four walls of their hotel room, she leads him through the streets of Edinburgh. In those instances, they’re constantly on the move, bouncing from building to building, and crowd to crowd, in order to avoid risk of anyone getting a good enough look at either of them to recognize they’re both fugitives that are wanted alongside Steve, Nat, and Sam.

Bucky doesn’t mind constantly moving. If anything, he’s grown used to this life by now, after his time living alone in Bucharest. He thinks Wanda is accustomed to it too, considering what she’s told him about her younger years living in the streets of Sokovia, avoiding soldiers and policemen who were opposed to the protests she and her brother frequently took part in.

At least now, she and Bucky both have a fair allowance they’re given through Natasha (who borrows from Stark), so they don’t have to worry about much else besides keeping their heads low. In fact, they make a little game out of finding somewhere new to eat each day. It even becomes part of their routine: a lazy morning in bed, a search for a place to eat, a discussion about nothing important as they wander about, another search for something for dinner, then back to their hotel for the rest of the night.

That is one thing Bucky likes about life in hiding this time. Even if it’s only for a few days, there’s a safe routine. He likes having company this time, too. He thinks he likes it maybe a little too much. He’s definitely more open with his affection for her than he originally imagined he would be. At first, he started holding her hand and kissing her in public for the sake of their cover as two unassuming American tourists, knowing no one would pay them much attention if they looked too wrapped up in each other to care about anything else. But then that boldness around her translated to their time alone, too. As much as they do visit with each other while in bed at the hotel, they also kiss and cuddle a lot as well.

He justifies indulging in her touch so often by telling himself he’s making up for the lost time they spent apart over the past year. He doesn’t need to justify his wants, he knows that, but it’s one of those things that still lingers from his Winter Soldier self. One of thankfully few things, now.

“James. Your mind is loud.”

“Sorry,” he says quickly in response to the anxiety in Wanda’s voice. He only went to the window to see how heavy the rain outside has gotten. He realizes now how it must seem to her, for the surface of his mind to be so alight with activity while he’s looking out the window of their room. “It’s nothing. Was just thinkin’ about this weekend. It’s been real nice.”

Wanda gives a little hum of agreement, wrapping her arms around him from behind. She rests her head between his shoulder blades, and he can feel through the thin material of his undershirt that her hair is still damp from the shower she just took. He knows he should take one too, to wash off the rain that caught them on their walk back from dinner, but for now, he just wants to enjoy having her curled around him a moment longer.

“Did Steve respond?” she asks.

“I haven’t checked yet.”

Wanda pulls away to check for him. The pager is easy to find, having gone untouched where she left it on the nightstand by the bed before her shower. “He says their area’s clear. That means they’ll probably head out tonight or tomorrow morning to regroup with us.”

“That’s good,” Bucky says, even though he only partially believes it. Regrouping means they’ll probably be moving somewhere else, all together. Which means having to leave this nice routine he has here, the same he’s only now learning to appreciate. “He say where we’re going next?”

“No.” Wanda sets the pager back on the nightstand, which means it’s not worth asking Steve at the moment. “We’ll probably take the first train out of country we can catch. It’s what we’ve done the last couple times.”

Guilt nips at him then, at the inadvertent reminder that she’s been doing this with the rest of the team for longer than he has. Because he was _hiding_ in Wakanda, from his feelings for her and the possibility of being rejected just as much as he was hiding from the authorities that want them all.

He curbs those bitter feelings for Wanda’s sake, hyper-aware of the fact that her scarlet is already picking up on some of them. Instead, he follows her to the nightstand, asking, “Where do you _want_ to go?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” she says dismissively.

Bucky sits on the bed right beside her, gently tugging on the end of her pajama sleeve, where the white cotton material wraps around her thumb. Wanda obediently steps into his waiting grasp, climbing up to straddle his lap so that he can bring her flush against his chest. He takes a moment to relish in how warm she feels against him. For the past few days, the weather outdoors has remained consistently cool, and getting caught in the rain today wasn’t much help. Some of the chill still lingers in his skin despite the fact he’s discarded his wet jacket and shirt. She begins lightly rubbing his shoulders, as if she can sense that.

Just as Bucky slips his hands under her shirt, Wanda continues. “I suppose it would be nice to visit somewhere big, like London. If only just to be able to stop there long enough to get another pair of these,” she says while looking down at the pajamas he currently has his hands in.

“They’re nice,” Bucky says lamely. It’s not so much the clothes that strike him, but how comfortable she seems in them. The kind of comfortable he spent so much of their time in Wakanda hoping she would feel around him. With her hair still damp from the shower, the ginger waves look darker, like they had been back then. He can almost pretend that they never left, that he was braver than he actually was, and they’ve been this at ease in a romantic relationship with each other all along.

“I think so, too. The shirt’s a little big, but…” Wanda shivers a little as his fingers skim over the inside of her thighs, where they’re exposed beneath her short shorts. Amused, Bucky does it again to get the same reaction.

“That tickles,” she admonishes.

“What?” he feigns curiosity. “This?”

This time, when he traces the same path over her thighs, he adds a light squeeze to each of them, earning himself an aborted squeal from her. “Yes! That!”

“What about this?” The tips of his fingers trace another invisible line, now down the backs of her thighs.

She squirms. “That is the same thing.”

“It is not.”

“It is!”

“No, I’m not convinced.”

Her eyes narrow in the seconds before she grabs his face between her hands and pulls him to her for a kiss. The kind that always takes him a little by surprise, then empties his mind to nothing more than her, and how beautiful she is, and how good it feels to be with her. The kind that’s deep and passionate, and leaves him floundering when she pulls away unexpectedly, still gazing down at him with a teasing gleam in her eye.

“Did that convince you?” she asks playfully, stroking the scruff at his jaw with her thumbs.

The small semblance of Bucky’s old self that still sits deep within him flirts back, smirking against her lips. “I don’t know. Do it again.”

He revels in the sound of her flustered giggle for a brief moment before he captures the sound in his mouth. The kiss starts a little slow, not unlike the last one. It takes a few breaths for Wanda to fully melt, opening her mouth to him. He slips his tongue between her lips, taking extreme care to only take what she offers. They’ve done this before, “made out” (for lack of a better term), but he’s still highly self-conscious of the fact that they’ve only started sharing this level of intimacy as of five days ago. Given the complex history both of them have with touch, he’s deathly afraid of pushing too far too soon, and potentially becoming associated with the likes of someone from her past, when she was viewed as nothing more than an experiment. When the only people around her were those who viewed her as less than human.

But for now, there doesn’t seem to be any of the fear or discomfort that comes from that. She even winds her arms around his neck to tug him closer, letting him kiss and kiss and kiss her while she simply holds on. Eventually, he moves them, rolling her onto her back. That leaves her flat against the bed right beneath him, his knee between her legs and his weight on his hands on either side of her head.

She takes a moment to catch her breath, hands still holding his face so that she can tug him back to her when she wants to. This time, he lets her take what she wants, feeling her tentatively push her way into his mouth. Again, this level of intimacy is still pretty new to the both of them. New, and exciting, and nerve-wracking all at once. Bucky’s more than happy to simply let her explore the new terrain for a while. Although, he does tense when her curious hands ghost over the scars that surround where his metal limb forces itself onto his body. That particular part of him isn’t used to being traced with such care, such reverence, and his skin rises with gooseflesh in response. Beneath the surface, his nerves also become alight with sensation, with a mounting arousal at just how good her combined touch and kiss feel. He doesn’t even realize his hips are involuntarily rolling against hers until she gives a tiny breath of surprise.

They’ve never done anything farther than this, but God, he wants to. He desperately wants her.

She pulls back for another breather. While she does, he does some exploring of his own, trailing kisses over her cheek, down her jaw, and along her throat. He finds a pulse point that betrays her excitement, both in her blood and through her scarlet, the latter running alongside the former as always. He gives the spot an experimental nip, receiving a slight shiver and curl of fingernails into his shoulders in response.

That gives him pause, wherein he carefully listens to her little breathy gasps for any sign of upset. There doesn’t seem to be any, especially with how she tilts her head to give him better access, so he continues worshipping her neck. It doesn’t take long for him to become lost in it, in the little sounds she makes because of him, in the feeling of her fingers digging into his back, in the scent of the soap the hotel provides that’s clinging to her skin. His hips roll again.

“James…” she whimpers. It takes him a second to notice, for he’s distracted by the heavy return of her Sokovian accent, and how much he enjoys the way it roughly wraps around his name. “James.”

That second attempt cuts through his haze. He pushes himself up, still somewhat dizzy from desire. “What—what is it? Are you OK?”

“We’re, um…” She swallows, eyes on his chest rather than his face. It occurs to him then that she _does_ seem nervous, and he leans back even more. “We should—we still need to…to see what Steve said. If he’s on his way.”

_Right. Steve._

The reminder of where they are, of the circumstances around them, sobers him completely. There’s no guarantee they’ll have privacy much longer, not with a majority of the world searching for them and their friends. Said friends may even need them at a moment’s notice, either to move to a safer location or for reinforcements against bounty hunters, police, or God knows what else.

“Right, right, yeah,” Bucky says awkwardly, fumbling to get off the bed and onto his feet. Wanda sits up, her expression unchanging. Or maybe he’s not paying enough attention because he’s simultaneously trying to give her space and struggling to hide his arousal.

“I should…I better wash up,” he manages to get out on his way to the bathroom.

Wanda doesn’t reply, and he doesn’t look to see if that’s because she’s messaging Steve or because she wants to hide, too. Tension builds in the silence that follows him out of the room, and it feeds into his own shame.

His body goes into autopilot, numbly carrying him through his night routine. He takes a cold shower, which when combined with the cold weather outside, makes the seam along his metal arm ache. He doesn’t pay it much mind. In fact, he considers it a fair distraction from his fear that he screwed up, that he irrevocably ruined how Wanda sees him. What was he thinking, pushing her like that? To just assume she was ready for that, after only five days? With the history she had? That they _both_ had?

Once he’s out of the shower, he realizes he left his sleep pants in the other room. To put off facing Wanda for a little longer, he merely steps back into the jeans he had on before. He goes through the motions mechanically, vainly trying to focus on the feel of the jeans and tank top against his skin rather than his incessant thoughts of what he’s done wrong.

He shouldn’t have pushed his luck. He should’ve waited for her to act first, to show she was ready. He should have waited for a time that was better. He should have—

“James?”

In his hurry to escape, he must not have closed the door all the way. It creeps open now, from the lightest knock against its other side. Wanda’s there, toying with her fingers despite having taken off her rings already. Her eyes are downcast, distant and uncertain, and her mouth sits open like she wants to something.

It takes her a few heartbeats to find his eye, much less the words. “…will you come to bed, please? I need you.”

And with that, she’s walking away. Not once does she look to see if he follows.

At first, he doesn’t. He’s too stunned. But a breath later, his mind catches up to him, fully realizing what he’s heard. That she wants him.

He steps out of the bathroom to find her standing at the foot of the bed, outlined by the one lamp she left on between the two windows of their room. The windows are on either side of her, with thin slivers of bluish light peeking through the blackout curtains covering them. They cast a somber shade around her, drawing more attention to her tense posture and blank expression. Doubt resurfaces in Bucky’s mind at the sight.

Wanda doesn’t acknowledge him as he ventures closer. She stands like a figure carved from marble, elegant and reserved even as she stares into nothingness. She’s hugging herself, head tilted towards the windows as if she’s only listening to the steady patter of rain against the windows. But Bucky knows better, though. Knows there’s a reason she fell into this pensive state while eyeing the bed.

“Doll.” His voice sounds disturbingly loud in the otherwise silent room. “We don’t have to do anything. If you want, we never have to—”

“I want to.” She doesn’t say that with much confidence. She seems to sense his suspicion, for her eyes finally land on him when she adds, “I do. It’s just that…we both might have to be a little patient with me.”

His heart pounds at his next thought. He doesn’t know why he never thought to ask before. “Have you ever—?”

“No.” She bites her lip, eyes shifting nervously. Her hands press more firmly into her sides, as if she’s battling the urge to fidget the way she normally does when she recounts something unpleasant to him. “For the longest time, I didn’t have anyone except Pietro. And then the experiments, they…they hurt me so bad, that I…” her voice cracks, “ever since then, I felt so…”

He knows what she’s trying to say. He thinks of his own body after years spent with Hydra. Thinks back to all the scars he has, particularly along the seam of his metal arm. How they make him feel like he’s something dark and corrupted. _Ugly._

He doesn’t know what to say. His heart aches with it, aches for her. He adores her so much, and it isn’t fair that she hasn’t had anyone since being separated from her brother. At least, not anyone that cared enough to make her feel good. To make her feel beautiful.

“That doesn’t matter,” he finds eventually, only to grimace at how awful it sounds. Of course how she views herself matters. What she thinks about _anything_ means so much to him. “You’re more than what they did to you, doll. You’re so much more than that.”

The corners of her mouth quirk up in a bitter, insincere smile. “I just wish I wasn’t so screwed up,” she starts to say. It’s her turn to hide from him, covering her face with her hands and not-so-subtly smothering out the wetness gathering in her eyes. “I, um…I can’t even get pregnant.”

That’s…harder to take. Based on his own experiences from Hydra, and from how long Wanda had been there, he’d figured whatever they had done to her was invasive. Invasive, and grueling enough to have lasting effects on her. But knowing the full extent of those effects, knowing exactly _how_ invasive they were on her body—on her _life_ … He feels so selfish for all the time they spent in Wakanda, helping him come to terms with the lingering holds Hydra has on him. All the while, skirting around the holds it still has on _her_ , in turn. She deserves better than that.

She deserves to feel beautiful.

“You’re more than that, sweetheart,” he whispers again. “It doesn’t change anything about…this.” _About us,_ he means. “You don’t have to do anything to…to prove yourself, or—”

“It’s not that. I do want to be with you, _for_ you. I…I want to be yours, in a way that no one can take away.”

It takes his mind a second to process what she means. Which is ironic, given that the battered state of his mind is just what she’s referring to. While her and Shuri’s combined efforts made Hydra’s lingering hold on his mind easier to live with, neither he nor Wanda are naïve enough to believe that influence is—or ever will be—completely gone. Hydra still has that power over him, a capacity to be triggered by something totally random and lose himself at a moment’s notice. Not only lose himself, but also how much the people close to him mean to him. Steve, and now Wanda.

But something physical like this couldn’t be lost. Maybe the memory of it could be, but not the symbolic nature of it. Of her being his in every way, for the first time ever for her. It’s been so long for him, it almost feels like a first on his end, too. He’s only been with one other woman in his life (that he can still remember), back during the war, and Hydra ripped that time away from him so often that now he can barely remember her face, much less the mechanics of his relationship with her.

So much of this feels new, and it’s a little intimidating because of that.

He doesn’t let himself fall too deep into it, though. He doesn’t want it to be about him. He wants it to be about Wanda, and how she deserves to feel good.

Bucky chances taking a step closer. When she doesn’t react, he frames her face between his hands, guiding her gaze to settle directly on him.

“Do you trust me?” he asks. He doesn’t need to, but he does anyways because he wants them both to be sure. He _needs_ her to be sure.

“You know I do,” she answers.

He does. He knows she wouldn’t be here if she didn’t.

Nevertheless, he’s careful as he brings her to him. He kisses her like he did before, slow and waiting for her to find what she’s comfortable with. He waits until she feels less tense before letting his hands drift lower, down to her thighs. Wanda makes a little sound of surprise when he lifts her up, but is quick to wrap her legs around his waist and tangle her fingers in his hair, clinging to him as he carries her to the bed.

He sets her down beside him, hesitating for a moment. After all, their living conditions still aren’t secure, vulnerable to change in the event anyone in the past few days recognized and reported them. He’s so afraid of someone coming for them, of ripping this away from him. Not to mention, he’s also still afraid of doing this wrong. Of hurting her in any way, after he’s already hurt more people than he can count.

He can’t tell if she’s absorbing any of those fears through her scarlet. She looks nervous more than anything, but still holds on to him, fingers curled stubbornly into his undershirt.

She wants him. This is OK.

“Lay back?” he prompts lightly.

She obliges, crawling backwards until she’s lying partially propped up against the pillows at the head of the bed. He follows, keeping his movements slow to gauge how she feels about having someone looming over her. He settles over her without putting any of his weight on her, similar to how he was earlier. He tries to stick to what he knows she’s familiar with for as long as he can, kissing her until she’s breathless. Then he trails his mouth over her cheek, along her jaw, down her neck. He takes his time worshipping the skin of her sternum, waiting for her to resume her previous little whimpers of encouragement before trying anything bolder. It doesn’t take very long for that, with her even tipping her head to give him better access and sweeping her hands along his shoulders and down his arms. He shivers with her touch, his jeans suddenly feeling too tight.

The witch makes an odd yelp when he finds a particular spot along her collarbone and worries it between his teeth.

“OK?” he frets.

Nodding, Wanda breathes a little laugh of embarrassment. “Was just the beard…”

“What about it?”

“Feels funny.”

They both laugh at that. It feels good to laugh. It’s like something he truly needed, effectively soothing his incessant nerves over messing this up. He stops to appreciate the easiness of the moment for a few more heartbeats, lovingly nuzzling the underside of her jaw. Then he goes back to her throat, retracing his trail down to her sternum. This time, he doesn’t hesitate to explore further. Using his flesh fingers, he tugs down one side of her top, and then the other. He can hear the material stretching to accommodate the action, but Wanda doesn’t seem to care. Her hands are tangled firmly in his hair again, not hard enough to hurt, but enough to encourage him onward.

He pulls her shirt down until it exposes the tops of her breasts. He kisses there, slowly drifting from one side to the other. Meanwhile, his flesh hand goes to her hip, trailing up her side until it finds her chest. He turns tentative again as he rests it on her breast, waiting a few seconds before he garners the nerve to carefully squeeze and sweep his thumb over her breast through the fabric of her sleepshirt and bra. Her hips involuntarily jerk up, and he takes that as a good sign regarding how she feels about his hands on her. Again, they’ve fooled around a few times this past week already, so it isn’t like his touch is terribly new to her.

Once Wanda is squirming and wantonly whining underneath him, Bucky slips his hand under her shirt, trailing it back up her body to properly feel the skin beneath. Her shirt becomes bunched up in the process, exposing the creamy expanse of her belly. It’s hard to tell if the flesh there rises with gooseflesh because of the chill in the air, or because she’s just as aware as he is that this is more of her than he’s seen before. Either way, he soothes the skin smooth again with more hot, languid kisses. When he runs out of skin, Wanda sits up to help him work her sleepshirt off completely, tossing it lightly to the side.

Now she becomes hesitant. Her body is wracked by a slight tremble, like she’s fighting not to cover herself. This is more of her than Bucky’s ever seen before, and with it, he can see more of her scars. Admittedly, he doesn’t pay them much mind at first. He’s too distracted by every other part of her, everything he’s only dreamed of seeing thus far. The curves of her breasts and her torso. The sparse scattering of freckles she earned in Wakanda. The softness of her skin, highlighted against the darkness of her grey bra.

There _are_ scars, though not as many as he’d first anticipated. Most are faint from age. Only one catches his eye immediately, leaving the flesh raised and silvery where it runs across her lower stomach, just a few inches shy of the hem of her shorts. It sobers him for a moment. He worriedly traces the scar with his thumb, wondering about it. Namely how it happened, and how much more of the trauma associated with it is she hiding from him.

Wanda wriggles, this time noticeably uncomfortable. “Please…it’s not…not now.”

He struggles with that, with being dismissive of her miseries (even if they’re past). But he figures he can ask more about the physical scars later. Tonight, he’s still concerned with soothing the figurative one.

Bucky sits back on his knees. He doesn’t miss the way Wanda’s face flashes with panic as he pulls away from her, so he tries to make his actions quick as he thumbs the hem of his own shirt and pulls it over his head. After it’s discarded, he leans over her again, still keeping the majority of his weight on the metal arm. With his other hand, he gently grabs her wrist and pulls it to the seam of his artificial limb, which she’s only felt through the fabric of clothing until now.

“These are my worst ones,” he admits, guiding her hand to the scars that trail from the seam into his sternum. The ones he vividly remembers inflicting on himself, vainly attempting to rip off the metal arm Hydra gave him in his first days of having it.

Her expression turns thoughtful as she traces the scars with the same concerned intrigue he’d had with the one at her stomach. All five of her fingers slide down the silvery flesh, almost perfectly mirroring how he first gained them. He suppresses an urge to shudder when she strokes them with a tender care that’s totally novel to that part of him. He doesn’t want to appear uncomfortable with the attention, for risk of encouraging her own discomfort with showing him her own scars.

For now, she doesn’t ask about how the violent marks came to be. She merely blankets them with her palm, looking up at him in a way that tells him she understands.

Her hand slips over the seam of the prosthetic, hooking under it to pull him back down to her. She all but devours him, pushing her way into his mouth with what feels like a desperate insistence. Then she drags more hot, sloppy kisses down the side of his neck, over his collarbone, and back towards the seam of his metal arm. She follows the line of coarse, raised skin as far as she can reach before drifting over to the smaller scars that branch out from it, tracing the ridges of them with her tongue. Now he does shudder, tilting his head with a heavy sigh as she erases the ache he previously felt there from the cold, and she transforms it into a source of pleasure. He rolls his hips into her, seeking friction—seeking more pleasure.

_No. Not yet._ There’s an audible whir from his artificial limb as the plates shift, betraying how much he’s struggling to hold onto his self-control. He’s not going to let himself get lost in his own desire until he’s ensured hers. He owes her that much.

He can’t quite manage to articulate his reasoning for pulling away from her glorious touch. He only leans back, taking a second to regather his wits before he brings his hand back to her breast, gently massaging one and kissing the smooth flesh at the top of the other. He takes his time there, ensuring she’s used to him touching her without the added layer of her shirt, before he tries touching her beneath her bra as well. The fabric is tight against her skin, one of those sports bras she wears almost constantly, in case they have to make a sudden run for it. Although now, that seems to be far from her mind, for she sits up with an air of impatience, helping him tug the material over her head.

Now even more of her is bare before him, and he can see her swallow hard, struggling with that. Meanwhile, he struggles with simply remembering to breathe. She’s so far from the ruined image she associates with herself. If anything, she’s more than he initially imagined, stunning, and pure, and too good for someone whose hands are as burdened and rough as his.

“ _Koldun’ya…_ ” he breathes. “You’re…”

“James, please…” She sounds torn as she speaks, like she can’t decide between encouraging him or hiding from him. She even wraps an arm around herself.

He’s not having any of that. Catching her wrist, he takes her arm away from her chest. He brings her hand to his mouth to press a reassuring kiss to her knuckles before he sets the offending limb at her side. Then he returns his hand to her breast and his mouth to the other. He kisses the top of the supple, unblemished flesh once again before he trails lower. His kiss finds her nipple, and then he seals his lips around it to suck.

Her loud, pleasured cry sends a jolt of painful arousal through him. It’s rapidly becoming harder to ignore, but he manages, albeit with another agitated shift of the plates in his metal arm. His second hand stays at her breast, carefully rolling her nipple between his thumb and forefinger while his tongue sweeps in a similar motion over her other one. When the bud in his mouth is firm and hard, he shifts to take the other between his lips and lavish it with just as much dedication. Wanda writhes beneath him, her head thrown back into the pillows and her fingers gripping his hair like a lifeline.

Once the witch’s breathy sighs turn frustrated, like she wants more, Bucky crawls lower down her body, pausing only to pepper kisses down her stomach and over _that_ scar that sits right above the hem of her shorts. Then he dips the tips of his flesh fingers beneath the band of said shorts.

It’s obvious what he wants to do, yet he feels the need to warn her just the same. “Is it OK if I touch you?”

Wanda nods, half-lidded eyes hazy with desire. He kisses her scar again, waiting for any hint of apprehension from her as he continues lower. When none appears, he leans back to use both hands to work her shorts down her body, receiving some help from her as she lifts her hips. However, once her shorts are fully off, Wanda immediately presses her knees together. He lays his flesh hand on them, momentarily struck by the realization that just one of his hands can wrap around them both. It reminds him of how small she is, how easy it would be for someone of his size and enhanced strength to hurt her without even trying. The thought unnerves him, rattling his confidence.

“James?” Wanda whispers, sounding out of breath. “Your mind…”

“Loud?”

She nods, this time with her gaze more grounded. She even props herself up on her elbows, brow wrinkled in concern. He leans forward to smooth away the latter with a light kiss, cupping her face with his flesh hand.

“It’s OK,” he promises. “Just thinkin’ too much. Don’t wanna mess this up.”

She gives a shaky smile. “I doubt _you_ have anything to worry about,” she breathes, a rush of insecurity clear in her eyes.

He claims another kiss, this one against her lips, as slow and careful and loving as their first one ever. She kisses back, not as boldly as she did back then, but arches against him as she does. Like she can’t decide between giving into her self-consciousness and giving into how much she wants him. She wants _him_ , in spite of knowing how much darkness is in him, how corrupted he was before meeting her.

“You’re too good for me,” spills senselessly out of him. “Love you so much, _koldun’ya_. Do you even know what it does to me?”

Despite anxiety still evident in the way her eyes flit inconsistently over his face, she lets her small smile turn coy. “I’d like to find out.”

He’s more than willing to show her. He kisses his way back down her body, moving slower, more reverently this time. When he reaches the top of the simple, black panties she has on, he once again slips his fingers beneath the surface of cotton. As he works the final article of clothing down the length of her legs, he languidly chases it with his mouth. He can feel her relax at the kisses to her thighs, causing her to mindlessly part her legs for him.

With her now completely bare before him (and with him wary of how vulnerable that must make her feel), he settles on his side beside her. His flesh fingers give her thigh a tender, parting squeeze before drifting up toward the juncture of her legs. He pays close attention to the way her eyes pinch shut, the way her face flushes, and the way her breathing picks up, all from that slow touch—from anticipation for where it leads.

But then as he reaches the very top of her thigh, her hand suddenly shoots forward, a vice-like grip seizing his wrist. He stops instantly, his gaze still trained intently on her face. He watches as her eyes peel open, and she sluggishly takes in what she’s just done. Something akin to confusion paints her expression at the sight. “I’m sorry, I…I don’t know why…”

He knows. Now that he knows just how invasive her past abusers were to her body, he understands why it would be in her muscle memory to refuse anyone near it, even against her own conscious accord.

“It’s OK,” he whispers. Leaning back, he places his metal hand over hers, guiding it to completely cover his flesh one, curling both of their fingers. “Here,” he says encouragingly. “Show me what feels good.”

Her guides her hand, still pressed between his, back to that place at the top of her thigh. Then he moves the metal hand away. It takes all of a second for her to register what he’s asking her to do. Once she does, she flattens her hand flush against his, taking control of how he moves against her. Carefully, she pushes his hand lower, curling her index finger over his to slip through her folds. He lets his hand fall completely limp, simply watching as she finds the angle and depth she wants on her own.

She cries out when she finally reaches that place she wants, and he leans down to kiss her quiet (they do have neighbors, after all). That reduces her excited sounds to muffled whimpers as she begins rolling her hips to meet his hand. He helps her by twitching his other fingers so that they rub against her bundle of nerves, and that has her yelping against his mouth. She spreads her legs wider, guiding him to the same spot over and over again until she’s quivering madly beside him, lost in pleasure from touching herself through him.

Eventually, Bucky can feel her relinquish more control to him, her fingers loosely tangling between his and merely hanging on to him. He uses the opportunity to venture lower, slipping his forefinger completely inside of her. She’s wet, and that eases the way through her tight, sensitive walls. They clamp down on him as if simultaneously trying to keep him out and pull him in. It feels amazing, and he desperately wants his pants off, wants to know what it would feel like around him, but he doesn’t dare try any of that now. Not until he knows she’s comfortable, both in mind and body, with having someone inside her.

Her hand falls away, haplessly gripping the comforter on either side of her as her hips rise up, shoving his finger deeper inside her. Bucky uses the greater reign on his hand to add a second finger when she thrusts back onto him, planting her feet against the bed for better leverage. She wails softly, and for a brief moment, he’s afraid it’s from pain or dislike. But when he tries to pull his hand away, her hips chase him, rolling in the direction of his hand. He gently thrusts both fingers back inside her, earning a couple of breathy moans from her as he repeats the action. He’s falls into a senseless rhythm of it, absolutely mesmerized by her blissful sounds, and the sight of his own fingers disappearing between her legs, and the fluid motion of her hips rolling onto his hand. By the image of her fucking herself on him.

He nearly loses his damn mind.

His body betrays his arousal again, hips thrusting against her thigh. He groans before he can stop himself, finding the roughness and constriction of his jeans to be almost unbearable.

“James?” Wanda gasps.

“It’s OK, I’m OK,” he insists. “What about you? Feels good?”

She nods. “Please,” she sobs, tightening her fingers around the clumps of comforter in her grip. “Please…keep going…”

She’s nearly there. He can see that. He wants to take her there—wants to be the one to give it to her more than he can remember wanting anything.

He leans over to kiss her, quieting her moans as they turn more frantic when he slips his thumb between her folds, caressing her bundle of nerves with it while his other fingers continue working her. His thumb circles over that part of her, purposefully dragging the rough edge of his nail over it to make her shiver. She practically screams into his mouth, rocking more and more wildly into his touch. He drops his face further into the crook of her neck, dragging open-mouthed kisses down her jaw. He makes his way to a particularly sensitive spot behind her ear, crooking his fingers inside her at the same time, and brushes his thumb over her clit again.

That’s too much for her. She tips over the edge with another soft, sobbing wail. Her muscles go taut, inner walls clenching tightly around his fingers. There’s a brief flash of scarlet on either side of her, followed by the sound of fabric ripping. Distantly, he’s aware he should be concerned with whatever damage they’ve done to a bed that doesn’t belong to them. But for now, he’s too distracted by Wanda to care—too entranced by her blissed out expression, and the ethereal glow of her eyes. Their entire sockets are encased by an unnatural scarlet, a sight that is unnerving and awe-inspiring all at once. Of all ways for her to lose control of the supernatural energy that resides within her, he supposes this is the best one. This way is through pleasure he was able to give to her. It’s through trust, both in herself to not hurt him and in him to make her feel good enough to comfortably let go of that control.

After a few heartbeats, she relaxes. The scarlet glow in her eyes fades, returning back to their normal shade of green against white scleras. She falls quiet, lips twisted in a small, content smile. He carefully pulls his fingers away from her to rest on her waist, his thumb sweeping against the lower part of her stomach, feeling it rise and fall with her heavy pants.

“You OK?” he asks.

For a moment, she doesn’t answer. She doesn’t seem able to, being too swept up in the aftershocks of pleasure. He watches her work through it, pulling her pliant form closer to him in order to kiss her hair.

“Did you…” she breathes against his neck, still sounding a little dazed. “You didn’t…what about you?”

“I’m fine,” he lies (he still feels like he’s going to _burst_ in his jeans at any moment). “Don’t worry about it—”

“No, I want…want to take care of you, too,” she insists. “Just…just give me a minute.”

Bucky grins fondly, still holding her close by her hip. He waits with her as she regathers her bearings. Breathes with her. Kisses the hinge of her jaw. As silence settles over the room, he starts to wonder if she’s too tired to keep going.

Suddenly, she’s grabbing at his pants, rushed hands fumbling to unbutton them and get the zipper down. She palms him through his boxers at the opening at the zipper, causing his hips to instinctively jerk into her hand. That slight bit of freedom has his erection spring up almost painfully, reminding him of how desperate is. He’s not going to last much longer, not if she continues to touch him like this, and not even with the serum Hydra gave him enhancing his stamina. Finishing like that, especially for their first time together…he’s not comfortable with that.

“Wait, wait,” he says, voice sounding pathetically wrecked already. “Wait, I can’t—I—”

Now she’s the one kissing him quiet, pulling her hand away to cup the back of his head. Her kisses come in short spurts at the moment, since she still seems to need time catching her breath. “Please,” she whispers in between them. “Make me yours.”

He can’t wait any longer to do just that. Crawling sideways, he makes his way between her legs. He takes a minute to sit up and push his jeans down until they’re bunched beneath his knees. There’s a second of hesitation, then he’s leaning down on his elbows again, this time with them resting on either side of her head. He’s hyper-aware of her reaction to having his body wholly on top of hers, knowing claustrophobia was ingrained into her from a time even before Hydra. Yet, no trace of that appears here. She only pulls his face down to kiss her until they’re both breathless again, pausing only for another plea to make her his.

At some point, her hands had made their way down his body, and are now trying to pull his boxers down. He scrambles to get them and his jeans off completely. Meanwhile, Wanda goes back to worshipping the seam of his metal arm. Once his clothes are discarded, she wraps an arm over his other shoulder and pulls him back down over her. He kisses her soundly, deeply, while his flesh hand trails down her side, across her stomach, and back between her thighs. It’s more of a challenge now, with how close they are, but he manages to reach her bundle of nerves, teasing her until she’s wet again. She spreads her legs, wordlessly offering herself to him. He shivers, feeling trepidation twist in his chest as he lays a hand—including the metal one—on each of her hips. Then he pulls her closer against him, slowly sliding into her.

_Oh, God._ She feels incredible _._ It takes every last semblance of his self-control to not lose himself in the desperate need to feel her surrounding him. He knows there’s pain to be had on her part, especially with the amount of trauma her body has seen during experimentation. Even with his slow pace, he hears her gasp and wince in discomfort, shaking fingers sinking their nails into his back. Protective wisps of scarlet faintly hiss to life, coiling around his arms.

And then he’s flush against her, completely sheathed in the tight, wet cradle of her body. He’s nearly overwhelmed by pleasure, his body trembling right down to the metal plates in his left arm, which audibly shift at his side.

“James?” Wanda murmurs fretfully.

He can’t formulate an answer right away. It feels like he can’t even think straight.

On a shaky breath, he manages, “You feel so good.”

That makes her smile, at least. Though her relief is tempered by lingering tension. She breathes in quick, measured gusts that reveal how accustomed she is to bearing physical discomfort. Bucky tucks his face into the crook of her neck, peppering several kisses along the curve of it in hopes of soothing her as her body shakes. He’s uncertain just how much of that is attested to pleasure or pain. He starts to pull away, only to have her clutch at him.

“James, please,” the witch whines.

“What?” he asks between pants. “What is it, sweetheart?”

She presses her knees against his hips as if afraid he’ll disappear if she doesn’t hold on to him. “Move.”

He does, still restraining himself to a torturously slow pace as he pulls out almost completely, then tenderly rolls his hips back into her. They both give a soft moan, and Bucky hesitates only a second more before thrusting again, building a tentative rhythm. It’s clumsy at first, as he shifts to find an angle that has him brushing against her bundle of nerves, that has her gasping with every thrust. She wraps her arms around his shoulders once he finds it, knees clamping even more firmly against his sides. The soldier slips his hand under her thigh to fully hook her leg over his hip, seeking to feel even more of her pressed against him. She pulls her opposite leg over his other hip, holding herself to him as he rocks into her with less and less restraint. He stays with it enough to curb his full strength, wary of the potential he has to hurt her even whilst becoming increasingly consumed by his own need.

Wanda arches into him, and he growls softly as another wisp of scarlet appears, flaring down his back from her hand as it moves to tangle in his hair. The unexpected rush of burning heat licking down his spine gives way to a delicious pain, making him gasp. The scarlet light swims in the air around them, blocking out the rest of the world. Narrowing time and space and thoughts to only them, to how they feel together. He briefly wonders again why it took him so long to get here, to let go of his incessant self-doubt and simply be hers, the way she so wants to be his now. He can’t imagine being without her— _losing_ her like he did this past year. Not now, when he knows how perfect it feels with her. He can’t fathom—he can’t—he wants—he _needs—_

His rhythm falters. He’s on the razor’s edge. Wanda leads him over that edge (intentionally or not, he can’t tell) by tipping her hips up, bringing him deeper inside her. She breathlessly moans something that sounds like his name, the accent of her homeland wrapping harshly around it, and that’s all it takes. His hips jerk once, twice, and then he’s coming with a muffled cry into her neck. His vision whites out with it, pleasure rolling up his spine. Vaguely, he hears his metal arm shoot forward to grip onto the headboard, effectively keeping the plates of the prosthetic from hurting her as they spasm. There’s a resounding _thud_ from the vibranium material meeting wood. The witch tenderly shushes him, giving his forehead a light kiss.

When Bucky fully comes back to himself, he realizes he’s slumped on top of her. Dread immediately cuts through his blissful haze, and he scrambles to get his weight off her, gracelessly pulling away and flopping down next to her. Wanda doesn’t seem to mind, though. She even reaches for him, her hand wrapping around his shoulders and tugging him back to her. He obediently rolls onto his side to curl against her, letting his arms wind around her waist to hug her close. Her hand snakes back into his hair in return, lazily stroking his head.

The room falls quiet. This time it’s a comfortable silence, both of them breathing easier now, satiated and content. The air around them is warm, smelling of sex. It crosses Bucky’s mind that it’s still not safe for them to be totally relaxed. They still need to be prepared to flee at any moment, or at the very least get cleaned up. Check in with Steve, and know when to be ready to meet for relocation.

But for now, Bucky allows himself a few moments more here. Indulges in feeling loose with fading euphoria, listening to the thrums of Wanda’s pulse and scarlet beneath his ear. For now, he does feel safe. Complete, even.

“How did I ever let you go?” he whispers.

She breathes a small, self-deprecating laugh. Hugs him impossibly closer. “Why did I ever leave you?”

He can’t answer that. He doesn’t want to think any more of how much time they wasted apart. So, he instead leans up to capture her swollen lips in a deep, languid kiss. She melts beneath him, clearly still as boneless and unwilling to move at the moment as he is.

The rest of the world slowly returns to him. The sound of rain patter against the windows outside. Some splashing from the streets below as cars drive through puddles. The feeling of a slight chill in their room, especially as the sweat on their bodies cools. Wanda shivers with that. Bucky rubs her side a few times, before reaching over to gather the edge of the comforter and fold it over her. It crosses his mind again that they should get cleaned up, and properly get under the covers for sleep—

“It was supposed to be on my hip.”

Wanda’s voice pulls him from his thoughts. He follows her gaze down her body, finding his fingertips had unconsciously drifted over the scar on her abdomen. He hadn’t intended to draw more attention to it, but now that he has, he sure as hell isn’t about to stop her from opening up about it.

Her gaze drifts elsewhere. Like she’s trying to keep her distance from what’s already passed. From whatever hurt her so badly that her body’s still marked by it. “Less blood that way, I think. But I…I got startled, so the cut ended up being there, instead. I hadn’t expected them to actually use the spear. The one that…gave me this.”

She twitches the fingers not in his hair, holding them over her chest. A knot of scarlet energy slithers into being, hovering just a few inches away from her palm. Then she folds her fingers over it, snuffing it out.

Bucky doesn’t say anything. In his mind, he wrestles with the image of her in a Hydra base somewhere—possibly even trapped by some of the exact same hands that replaced his arm and tore up his mind over and over. He’d known they triggered Wanda’s enhancements through exposure to an alien artifact, but he hadn’t known it was a _spear_. Something about that seems so much crueler, more savage than what he’d originally envisioned.  

“You never told me about that,” he muses out loud.

She gives another mirthless laugh. “I didn’t think you wanted to hear. Especially when you were being reminded of what they did to _you_ so often. And knowing that I asked for it…”

“No, you didn’t,” he insists softly. They’ve had this conversation before; that she hadn’t entirely known what she was signing up for when she agreed to be experimented on. He thinks Hydra purposefully left her in the dark for a majority of the ordeal on purpose, to manipulate her into believing she was truly doing something to benefit her war-worn country. Evidently, she still thinks it was purely her own naïve ignorance that led her to agree to it. “Even if that was true, it doesn’t mean it still didn’t hurt you. If you ever wanna talk about it, I do wanna hear.”

He feels like he should offer more— _do_ more. But for now, Wanda seems content again, and that, he supposes, is all that matters. A more sincere smile quirks at the corners of her mouth. She closes her eyes, gently pulling his head close enough to rest his forehead against hers. Her free hand joins the first at the back of his head, holding him against her, and her leg hooks around his hip. It’s a little possessive, but he doesn’t care.

“I think you’re the one that’s too good for me,” she murmurs.

Bucky grunts, unconvinced. “I think we’re gonna have to agree to disagree there.”

“Guess so.”

“Mm.” He nuzzles the soft, pliant skin of her cheek. “Love you a lot. You know that?”

“You might have mentioned it.” He can hear her playful smile. Then, she adds more quietly, more heartfelt, “And I love you, too. I’m really glad you’re here.”

“‘Course I am, doll. I’m not leaving you again. I’m all yours.”

“And I’m yours,” she promises, sounding almost proud of the fact.

A deep fondness tugs at his heart, tightening his grip around her waist. He lets his mind drift for a moment more, sinking wholly into contentment. Into a feeling of belonging, at last, to someone he chose for himself. Someone who understands, and accepts, and loves him. He revels in that novel feeling, lightly rubbing his flesh fingers up and down her spine, and wonders why he ever settled for anything less.


End file.
